


First Born

by luulapants



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Complicated Sibling Relationships, Gen, Peter Hale Character Study, The Hale Fire (Teen Wolf), Young Peter Hale, Young Talia Hale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 03:36:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29895030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luulapants/pseuds/luulapants
Summary: A study of Peter's complicated relationship with his older sister, told through childhood memories and their last night together - the night of the Hale Fire.
Relationships: Peter Hale & Talia Hale
Comments: 10
Kudos: 22





	First Born

**Author's Note:**

> For [Top Dogs Week](https://teenwolflegacy.tumblr.com/post/642240370631196672/join-us-for-a-week-of-celebrating-teen-wolfs-top), day 1 - character study

The stairs down to the old servants’ entrance squeaked horrendously in the middle, but Peter had learned that he could press the sides of his feet against the walls, where the support was strongest, and slowly creep downward without making a sound. It was a narrow little passageway, windowless, which once carried maids and butlers from the servants’ quarters on the third floor down to the study on the first. Secret stairs and hidden passageways, all meant to ensure that the help was neither seen nor heard, as much as possible.

In what was perhaps a fit of youthful melodrama, Peter found it dreadfully appropriate that they had put his bedroom on the third floor. His parents, he thought, liked him the way the manor’s previous owners had liked their servants: out of sight, out of mind.

He stopped on the fifth step from the bottom – the one that didn’t squeak at all – and quietly sat himself on it. Peter had to strain to hear through the bookcase that covered the passageway, which was good. It meant someone in the room would have to strain to hear his heartbeat as he listened in.

“Now Gianna is making claims on Deucalion’s territory,” said a rough, bass voice. Peter’s Uncle Ambrose. “It’s outrageous. After everything Ambrose Ward did for her.”

“That territory has belonged to the Ward pack for a century,” said an older woman. Peter’s great aunt, Maxine. “She becomes an alpha through bloodshed, and now she thinks she can come home and take the land from its rightful heir?”

After a pause, his mother spoke in her soft yet somehow imposing tone. Talia said she spoke quietly so that people had to work harder to listen, which caused them to assign more importance to her words than they might otherwise. “What do you think, Talia?” she asked.

They’d been doing this lately, both of their parents. Posing tactical questions to their eldest, preparing and assessing her for when she would someday become alpha.

“Ambrose took Gianna into their pack when she was very young,” Talia replied, polite but authoritative. She tried so hard to sound like a fucking adult. She was, technically, now. Nineteen. But she’d been doing this grown-up act for as long as Peter could remember. “Her kill was justified, and now she’s an alpha who needs territory. Instinct is driving her to the only home she’s ever known. It’s not her birthright, but she feels entitled.”

When she spoke, all of the adults listened. Even after she stopped, the room was silent, patiently waiting for Saint Talia to continue spouting her precocious wisdom.

“The best course of action is to appeal to Gianna and Deucalion’s shared love for Ambrose, to get them to work together in his memory. Maybe if her old pack helps her establish elsewhere, it won’t feel like she’s being cast out.”

“An empathetic assessment,” his mother said.

Then his father spoke: “If you’ll excuse me for a moment.” His chair scraped. Footsteps. The door to the study opened and closed.

“Now,” his mother continued, “they may claim it’s not our place to step into this conflict. However, any infighting amongst the packs opens us to greater threats.”

His father’s voice came through the wall behind the stairwell, in the vicinity of the kitchen: “Peter. Get to your room. Right now.”

Peter’s heart plummeted into his stomach at the ice in that tone. He chewed on his lip, forcing down the stab of fear and resentment. Then he got up and silently crept back up the stairs, where his father would be waiting for him.

  
  


* * *

  
  


The power had been cut, he realized. Peter flipped two more light switches to be sure as he hurried the little ones down the hallway. That was why the fire alarms never went off – they were hard wired into the house, a custom system that wouldn’t overwhelm wolf senses when they sounded. Between the smoke, the moonless night, and no electricity, they had only the dim glow of the fire to light their way. Peter’s eyes shone gold as he peered through the darkness.

“Mommy!” Emma wailed, sprinting ahead through the hazy hallway to where her mother, Peter’s cousin, stood on the other side of the main stairway to the foyer.

Pattie wore a yellow nightgown, her hair hanging over her shoulder in a long braid. She dropped to her knees when she saw the kids, arms open wide to catch Emma as she ran into them. She hugged her tight and kissed her hair. “Oh, baby, baby, I’m here. You’re alright.” Michael, normally too aloof for such desperate shows of affection, ran into her arms right after.

“Where are the others?” Peter asked, Bailey clutched to his chest and wailing.

“They were looking for Cora – she wasn’t in her bed,” Pattie said as she rose to her feet.

They ushered the children down the stairs. From the foyer, Peter could see that the flames were coming from both sides of the house, only just starting to lick up the walls here in the center. Someone had done this, then. No accident.

Pattie reached the front door first. She pulled it open, extended an arm, and cried out in alarm as it refused to pass through. “No,” she gasped. “No.” She turned to look at Peter, her narrow brown eyes widened in alarm. “Mountain ash.”

His stomach dropped.

“It’s okay,” he assured her, though he wasn’t sure if he believed it. “We can get Dan to break it. It’ll be fine.” Peter thought about trying to get Bailey through the front door, Pattie and Dan’s only human child, but it wouldn’t work. She was too little, too scared. He looked up at the stairs, trying to hear the movement of the others over the roar of the fire. “We should go for the tunnels, though,” he decided.

Peter passed Bailey to her, though the baby screamed and clawed at his shirt.

“Take the kids and go downstairs,” he told her. “I’ll run and tell them where we’re going.”

Pattie nodded, heading for the door to the basement, on the side of the stairway.

A creaking noise above caught Peter’s attention, and he looked up to see Talia and Wes hurrying across the second floor balcony, Dan and Maxine close behind them. No Cora. The flames were licking hot on their heels. “Peter!” his sister called.

A long, low groan echoed through the foyer.

It all seemed to happen in slow motion while Peter stood there, frozen, and watched. Pattie stood at the basement door, the baby hugged against her chest. Dan and Maxine were on the balcony directly over her, both of them turning back in the direction of the noise. Their mouths fell open just as the floor began to buckle beneath them.

Talia made a lunge toward the collapsing balcony. Dan and Maxine reached for her, hands outstretched, but not far enough as they fell. Wes barely managed to catch Talia, pulling her back from the collapsing edge of the floor.

Pattie never looked up. She gazed directly ahead at Peter, her arms tight around the baby. Her eyes flicked toward Emma and Michael, who stood between them.

Peter caught them, covering their eyes, precious seconds too late. They both saw. One moment, their mother and sister, father and grandmother; the next, a pile of flame and rubble.

“MOMMY!” Emma shrieked, thrashing against Peter’s arm as he held her tighter to his chest.

Michael had gone stiff. Still. Quiet. Peter smelled urine.

At the top of the stairs, Talia was screaming, her eyes glowing red. Wes had an arm around their sister’s middle, hauling her bodily down to the foyer.

“There’s mountain ash on the door,” Peter called. His own voice felt miles away from himself. “We have to use the tunnels.” He stared at the flames where the basement door had been. “The servants’ stairs,” he told them. “We’ll take the servants’ stairs.”

  
  


* * *

  
  


A soft knock sounded on Peter’s door, but he already knew it was Talia. He rolled over in bed to face the wall and didn’t say anything.

She sighed. “Peter, I’m coming in.” The door opened. She slipped inside and closed it behind her. Six steps to the bed, and then she sat on the edge, the mattress dipping.

Neither of them said anything for a minute. Peter’s rage sat too high in his chest, the kind that threatened to wrap around his throat and burn behind his eyes and make him break down crying, make him look sad when he wasn’t. He was furious.

“I heard you got in trouble,” Talia finally murmured.

Peter’s voice came out too thick as he spat, “I wasn’t even doing anything.”

Talia set a hand on his arm. He snarled. She pulled it away.

“You know you’re not supposed to be listening in on meetings like that,” she said patiently. “What were you even doing? Come on, that’s all boring stuff. You’re a kid. Worry about kid stuff.”

“You’re allowed to be there,” he spat.

Talia laughed.

Peter ground his teeth together.

“Yeah, and I’m a whole lot older than you. I have to go deal with that boring stuff for training.”

He peeked over his shoulder at his sister. Even sitting on his bed, in what was meant to be a casual, intimate conversation, she held her neck long and stiff, chin high. Peter thought it was probably some crap about conveying confidence and authority, probably something their parents drilled into her before he was even born. In his mind, though, he imagined an invisible crown carefully balanced atop her head. Princess Talia. Someday Queen Talia.

She reached over and slipped her hand into his. This time, Peter didn’t pull away, but he didn’t soften the glowering, slightly red-eyed expression on his face. Talia squeezed gently. “He didn’t go too hard on you, did he?” she asked.

The sting of the spanking had long since faded, but the humiliation remained. “What do you care?”

Giving him a fondly scolding look, Talia sighed, let go of his hand, and shifted around to lay on the bed. She cuddled up behind him, her arm around his middle. She nudged her nose against the back of his neck, scenting him. Despite himself, Peter hugged her arm close and tangled their fingers together again. He and his older brother horsed around sometimes, when Wes wasn’t too busy with basketball practice or chasing after girls. But Talia was the only one that held him like this anymore.

“I know you’re angry,” she whispered, her breath hitting the soft hairs at the base of his skull. “I know you feel left out. It’s okay if you want to be angry at me.”

Peter turned his face against his pillow, eyes burning just as he knew they would, and he sniffled against the fabric.

  
  


* * *

  
  


The smoke wasn’t as thick in the basement, but Peter could hear the flames crackling across the floor above them. Wes carried Emma, who had screamed herself hoarse but kept on wailing with an unsettling rasping sound. Michael walked beside Talia, almost robotic in his stiffness. There was a dark stain of wetness down the legs of his pajama pants. He hadn’t said a word, and Peter knew it would take a long time for him to recover once they got out of this mess.

He didn’t let himself think ‘if.’

“Cora?” Peter whispered, hoping that Michael would be too out of it to hear.

Talia looked back at him. He had never seen her so broken. Not when her husband died. Not when she miscarried her third pregnancy. Not when either of their parents had died. She had just lost four pack members at the same time. Peter knew it hurt for the alpha – a physical hurt. She looked hollowed out.

She fell back to walk beside him, her eyes fixed on Michael as they approached the tunnel entrance. “I don’t know. She wasn’t in her bed. I thought maybe the roof –” Cora liked to sneak up there sometimes, kept getting in trouble for it. Talia shook her head again. “That part of the house had already collapsed. I can’t feel her, but I can’t feel her gone either. I don’t know.”

“What about Derek and Laura?” Peter asked. “Can you feel them?”

Again, she shook her head. “Can you smell it?” she asked.

Peter inhaled. He smelled smoke, primarily. Sweat and pain and grief. He frowned and sniffed again. There. Twisted up with the stink of ash, he smelled something floral. Fragrant.

“Wolfsbane in the fire,” Talia whispered. It meant that any injuries they sustained would take longer to heal. Much longer.

Wes looked back at them when she spoke, a horrified expression on his face. Then, abruptly, he collided with an unseen barrier, maybe ten feet into the tunnel. He backed off a few steps. Peter rushed forward, already knowing what he would feel when he stretched out his hand to touch it. More mountain ash.

He couldn’t breathe. It wasn’t the smoke, but he couldn’t breathe all the same, chest too small to hold the air as he tried to suck it in. “No,” he gasped. “No.”

As his vision started to blur, he felt two strong hands grip his shoulders. He looked up and saw his sister, her face ferocious despite the agony that threaded itself through underneath. “Get it together,” she snapped. “We’re not done yet.” She placed a hand over his chest, and it was like she pushed the breath into him.

* * *

Peter heard the front door open downstairs, happy voices speaking quickly, animated. They spoke loudly enough that he could have heard what they were saying, if he tried. He didn’t try. He threw his bouncy ball against the ceiling again, so it bounced off the wall and back into his hand. There were dents where it had hit before.

A good ten minutes later, he heard a quick knock on his door. Talia’s breathless voice: “It’s me.”

He threw the ball again.

“I’m coming in.” She slipped inside, falling back against the door with a wide grin on her face, eyes closed and a hand splayed over her baby bump. “Oh my god, Peter, it was the most incredible thing. You’re never going to believe it. We got a lead on the feral omega that’s been digging up graves.” She spoke quickly, words tripping over one another in her rush to get them out. “We found her. She was – oh, I’ve never seen anyone so far gone. Not even on the full moon. But you should have seen how dad was with her. It was like there was no humanity left in her, but he – ”

Peter threw the ball harder and the drywall cracked, some of it sprinkling down. The ball fell off to the side of the bed, rolling over the floor.

Talia went quiet, frowning at him. Then her eyes moved to his basketball uniform, wadded up on his desk chair. Her mouth fell open. “Oh, Peter, your game,” she sighed. She put a hand over her mouth. “I’m so sorry. We – we totally forgot.”

He sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. “Yeah. I know,” he snapped. He walked over and picked the ball up. “Mrs. Duncan had to drive me home.”

“How’d you do?” she asked.

“I got MVP,” he muttered. “Not that anyone in this house cares.”

Talia looked slightly miserable – not miserable enough in his opinion. “That’s amazing,” she told him. She took a few steps forward, wrapping her arms around him so her swollen belly pressed against his side. “I’m really sorry, bud.”

Peter stood stiffly, arms at his side. Then, abruptly, he shoved her away. “I don’t need apologies from you,” he snarled. “God, do you even know what a stuck-up fucking bitch you are?!”

“Peter!” she gasped.

“Everything’s gotta be about you, doesn’t it?” he yelled. “Perfect Talia and her alpha training! Talia’s perfect test scores! Talia’s perfect wedding! Talia’s perfect baby’s perfect fucking ultrasound!” He threw the ball at the wall behind her, hard enough to put another hole in it.

She gaped at him, hurt, but not hurt enough.

“I hate you!” he yelled. “I hope you die!” He felt the inevitable tightness in his throat, burning behind his eyes. Peter frantically tried to sniff it back, pressing the back of his hand to one of his eyes. “And then what would they do, huh? Without Saint fucking Talia to take over as alpha?”

Talia pressed a hand over her stomach. A tear slid down her cheek. “Peter, you don’t mean that.”

The door slammed open, banging against the wall with the force. Wes charged past her, grabbing Peter roughly by his shoulder. “What the hell is the matter with you!” he snapped. “You don’t talk to your sister like that!”

“Fuck you, Wes!” Peter growled. He felt his claws slipping, eyes flashing.

He could hear footsteps on the stairs. His mom and dad, no doubt. Maybe his brother-in-law, if he was here. Everyone running to Talia’s defense. From the hall, he could already hear his father yelling, “I don’t want to hear that kind of language, Peter Hale!”

“I hate all of you!” he screamed. Peter yanked away from Wes, who grabbed at him again, but not before Peter could hop over his bed for the window.

“Peter, don’t you –!” Talia began to yell. Peter was already out the window though, hitting the grass hard enough to hear something snap in his ankle. He ran anyway. He didn’t even know where to.

* * *

  
  


“We can dig out,” Wes said. He stood beside them, Michael pressed to his side, Emma propped on his opposite hip and still gasping mostly-silent sobs. “Talia, if you can break through one of the walls, we can dig out into the surrounding dirt. If we can’t climb out, we can get to a water main, flood the basement to keep the fire from spreading to us.”

“Alright,” Talia agreed, already moving back into the main area of the basement. The house groaned above them through the din of the roaring fire and the crunch of falling wood. She positioned herself in front of a wide, blank wall. Peter walked past to stand on her left, closer to the stairs, Wes and the kids to her right. She squared her shoulders as she shifted, face transforming and eyes glowing red. Four sets of golden eyes shone in return.

Talia charged the wall, right fist held high, and struck with a loud crack that Peter was sure came from her bones as much as the masonry. A massive fissure ran down the length of the wall, a bit of stone crumbling from the center where her fist had landed.

Talia flexed her hand, no doubt willing it to heal quickly. She went at it with her left fist the second time, striking hard on the same fissure. This time the cracking noise started in the center of the wall, then carried on up along the top, spreading in a Y-pattern as more rock fell away.

The house moaned horrendously above them, and Peter looked up to see the beam of the floor strut above her starting to buckle. “Talia!” he shouted, his voice barely audible over the noise as the floor began to come down, the wall in front of her crumbling.

The beam came down in a rain of ash and flame. For a moment, Peter couldn’t see anything. Just smoke and flame. He heard a wailing noise and moved toward it, crawling on his hands and knees. He couldn’t remember how he’d ended up on the ground.

When he reached Talia, he saw that the beam had pinned her at the hips, her torso free of the collapse. He thought that was good. Then he looked at her hips and saw that the beam was flush with the ground. His mind couldn’t make sense of it. It was like her body just stopped halfway down.

“Peter,” she gasped. Her hair fanned out beneath her head, black with ash. Her hand reached out, groping blindly in the air. He clasped it in his own. “They’re gone,” she cried.

“What?”

“Wes,” she said. “The kids. I felt them go.”

Peter looked up into the raging flames on the other side of the basement. It was like the whole house had fallen in on that side. He heard a choking noise and realized that it had come from his own mouth. The basement was so hot, boiling. His skin hurt and the tears dried on his cheeks the moment they were shed. He squeezed her hand and closed his eyes. We’re not done, she had told him before. He took a ragged breath and gazed down at his sister’s face. Blood trickled from the side of her mouth.

“Talia,” he said, voice odd and ragged as he spoke. “If I become the alpha, I might be able to survive. I can’t make it like this. Not as a beta.”

“It’ll go to Laura,” she told him.

Peter swallowed around a knot in his throat and shook his head. “Not if I… not if I take it.”

She stared up at him in confusion.

“Talia, I can’t save you,” he cried. He looked at the place where her lower half should have been. “I’m sorry. You’re not going to make it out of here. But I could. Please.”

She made a soft, garbled sort of noise. Peter had to bend closer, ear near her mouth, to hear her. “If you survive,” she said, “won’t be… strong enough. Wolfsbane. You’ll be… weak. Derek. Laura. They need… Hunters did this. You can’t pro-protect… if you… Laura needs it. Laura.”

Peter pulled back, gaping at her in horror. “You want me to burn alive down here?” he asked. A swell of heat burst from the direction of the stairs, and he cried out.

“My children,” she rasped again. “Please.”

“You want me to die?” Peter choked on the words. The smoke was so thick now. His head began to swim, and when he came back to himself, it was with a bubble of rage. “After all this time. You’d rather I die than become the alpha.”

Talia started coughing, blood frothing on her lips.

“No,” Peter growled. “You don’t get to make that choice.” He extended his claws, the move taking more effort than expected. He raised his hand above her throat.

Her eyes went wide, glowing red. Then Talia gritted her teeth, fangs extending. She snarled.

Peter watched with horror as the red faded to a dull, glowing gold. Then dark.

“No,” he mumbled, disbelieving. She had willed it away. Willed it to Laura. Damned him. Killed him. “No, you bitch!” he roared. His hand slashed downward, slicing through her throat. There was hardly a trickle of blood. Hardly anything left.

Peter curled over her, shoulders shaking with sobs. Faintly, over the roar of the fire, he heard sirens. A beam fell beside him, and suddenly he was engulfed in flames, howling as he tried to put it out with his hands. “No!” he shrieked. “No!”

The sirens were outside, but all Peter could see was horrid, blinding light.

  
  


* * *

  
  


Talia found him sitting on a fallen log near a stream, a good three miles into the preserve. Peter had his arms wrapped around his knees, face pressed against them. He’d been crying on and off, but had stopped for a while before he heard her footsteps approaching. He didn’t say anything, didn’t so much as look up as she sat beside him.

Around them, the forest sang its nighttime songs – chorus frogs and crickets, owls and the soft rustle of leaves overhead. The burble of the stream.

“I’m sorry we missed your game,” she whispered.

Peter said nothing, pressing his face more firmly against his knees.

Talia placed a hand on the center of his back. “I’m sorry they don’t...” He could hear the click of her throat as she swallowed, the quickening of her pulse. “...they don’t care like they should. I wish I could make it different, Peter. I don’t know how.”

A new sob worked its way loose from his chest, noisy and shaking his whole body with the force of it. Her arm slipped around him, and Peter leaned against her, pressing his face to the firm swell of her stomach.

“It’s not fair,” he choked.

She stroked his hair. “I know.” He felt her lips on the top of his head. “I know.”

Peter stayed like that until the new tears passed. It felt like a long time. Finally, he sniffled, wiped his nose with his hand. He sat up and looked his sister in the eye. “I’m sorry for what I said,” he told her.

Talia pushed his hair off his forehead. “I know.”

“I don’t want you to die.” His voice came out in a croaking sort of noise.

“I know that, too,” she agreed, leaning forward to kiss his forehead. “You’d miss me too much.”

A smile started to fight its way onto his lips. “I guess,” he mumbled.

She laughed. “You guess?” Her fingers darted forward, poking at his ribs to make him squirm. “You guess?”

Peter laughed, his voice too loud in the quiet of the forest. He fell against her again, arms wrapped around her middle. It was harder to hug her now, with her belly in the way.

Talia’s fingers stroked over his back, tracing little spirals. Maybe a triskele. “You know, I can’t help noticing,” she murmured, “that you’ve been quieter with me since I told you about the baby. Can you tell me why?”

He kept his head low, eyes shut. The words felt easier to say like that, when he could pretend he was saying them into the dark. “If you’re busy being a mom...” His voice shook as he spoke. “…if you’re busy being a mom to the baby, you won’t have time to be mine.”

The scent of salt was the only indicator that Talia had started to cry. She didn’t make a noise with it. “What if I want you to help me with the baby?” she whispered.

Peter snorted. “How am I gonna help with a baby?”

Her fingers pushed through his hair again. “You know, I was only a little older than you when you were born.” He knew that, objectively. He’d never really thought about it, though. “Mom let me pick out your name in the hospital,” Talia continued, her voice soft and soothing. “Peter, like Peter Pan. I never wanted you to grow up. You were so tiny, and I felt so big holding you in my arms.” She hugged him against her chest, like she was remembering it, imagining him that small again.

Peter sat up, though he didn’t pull away. He wasn’t that much shorter than her anymore. He’d catch up with her in middle school, probably. By the time he was in high school, he’d be taller than her, like Wes.

“You know, if the baby’s a boy, we’re going to name him Derek, after David’s father,” Talia told him. She smiled and stroked his cheek with the backs of her fingers. “Why don’t you pick out a name if it’s a girl?”

He stared at her, imagining standing in a hospital room and holding her baby, his niece, in his arms. The same way Talia had held him. “Okay,” he agreed.

Peter looked over his shoulder in the direction of the house. In his mind, it was nothing but an oversized mausoleum, filled with secret passages and too many places to disappear. “I don’t want to go back,” he whispered.

“We have to go home eventually,” she replied, patient, “but we can stay here a while longer.”

They stayed until the air grew too cold for comfort, until Peter could hardly keep his eyes open. Talia pulled him to his feet, and they started their trek back, hand in hand.

“What about Laura?” Peter asked, as they slipped away into the dark of the trees. “It doesn’t mean anything. I just like it.”

Their voices carried far on the night breeze, down the ravine to the burbling stream and up through the thick canopy of leaves. Birds, quiet in their nests, stirred as they passed beneath.

“It means something,” Talia said.

**Author's Note:**

> I have a lot of feelings about these two, and I'm really interested to hear what your takes are and what you got out of this version of them. I love to get comments! You can also find me at luulapants.tumblr.com.


End file.
